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“You appear to be listening to one conversation whilst attending to three others.”
Baines smiled. “Now you flatter me.”
“I do not.” Lady Beckenham regarded him for a moment, then leaned back in her seat. “What do you want to know?”
Baines crossed one ankle over the other. “Why do you assume I want to know anything?”
“Because you have spoken to Pembroke and Lady Dunsmore at length, which no one would do unless searching for information.”
He almost laughed. “Have you been watching me, Lady Beckenham?”
“I am observant.”
Baines considered the choice between deception and partial truth. “Political conversation occurs at these gatherings.”
“One might say, too much.”
“Might one notice whether the same people attend them repeatedly?”
“Some do, yes.”
“Have you, perhaps, noticed conversations being repeated elsewhere?”
“Of course. ‘Tis the way of these things.”
“A faultless explanation,” he praised, inclining his head in acknowledgement.
“I thought so.”
Baines smiled. “It cannot have escaped you that someone is also divulging secret information to the papers.”
Her expression did not change, but her fingers tightened slightly upon the folded letter.
“Why did you not report it?” He pressed his advantage.
“To whom?”
“Renforth.”
Lady Beckenham looked towards the windows. “Because I cannot be certain of the culprit. People repeat gossip, Major. That is what Society does.”
“Not word for word, ma’am.”
Her gaze returned to his.
Baines felt something in the air shift.
“I first noticed it happen after a gathering in Yorkshire. Something Lord Altham said over dinner appeared in a pamphlet several weeks later. I remembered because the phrase was unusual.”
“What phrase?”
‘As well as if his education
Had lost ten millions to the nation’
Baines recognized the line from one of Renforth’s reports. “A deliberate misquote of Shelly? Who was present at this gathering?”
Lady Beckenham’s eyes narrowed. “Surely you already possess the list?”
